Medieval Quotes (Chaucer)

I have some amazing quotes from my literature this week. Some amusing and some not. However, they are all good. Even the semi-offensive Chaucer is not as anti-feminist as it might seem. Or perhaps it is :) Its just resigned to the will of a woman regardless of whether it respects it or not.

This is from The Manciples Tale:

"A good wyf, that is clene of werk and thoght, (A good wife that is clean of work and thought)

Sholde nat been kept in noon awayt, certayn; (Should not be watched suspiciously, certainly)

And trewely the labour is in vayn (And truly the labor is in vain)

To kepe a shrewe, for it wol nat bee. (To keep a shrew for it will not be)

This holde I for a verray nycetee, (This hold I for a true foolishness)

To spille labour for to kepe wyves:" (To waste labor to keep wives)

this comes right before his description of a caged bird and says basically put any bird in a cage and treat is great as you want to and it will prefer to starve outdoors than live well in a cage. I can't say whether Chaucer intends to tell men not to cage wives because it is wrong or as he clearly states, its a waste of time to bother. A cheating wife will cheat and a good wife will be good and you cannot change that. And in conjunction he tells this story of a crow that is white and sings beautifully until the day he sees his master's wife cheating on him and tells the husband. The man kills the wife, and then in a fit of remorse rips off all the feathers of the crow and curses it to black forever and to only cry sorrow, death and etc. And the Manciple says in the end my mother always told me to hold my tongue and "Ne telleth nevere no man in youre lyf/ How that another man hath dight his wyf" (Tell no man in your life/ how that another man had sex with his wife)

But on a darker though more romantic light Chaucer's book of the Duchess is a tract for John of Gaunt on the death of his wife, commemorating her. In the book he tells of a dream vision where he meets a knight weeping in the woods who speaks of the death of his lover.

"This ys my peyne wythoute red (This is my pain without remedy)

Alway deynge and be not ded" (Always dying and being not dead)

and later

"For whoso seeth me first on morwe, (For whoever sees me first in the morning)

May seyn he hath met with sorwe, (May say he has met with sorrow)

For y am sorwe, and sorwe ys y." (For I am sorrow, and sorrow is I.)

These are the medieval quotes that I really like from my Chaucer module this week so I figured I'd share them. I've had a few classics from earlier on but I shan't bore you with too much middle english today. Maybe another day.

Oh one more. There is a dispute solved with wine in the prologue to the Manciples tale and the host says "O Bacus, yblessed be thy name, (Oh Bacchus[God of Wine fyi] blessed is thy name)

That so kanst turnen ernest into game!" (That so can turn seriousness into a game)

[All the quotes come from "The Riverside Chaucer 3rd Edition gen. ed. Larry D. Benson, Oxford University Press, the translations are my own]